M.N.: This is the true face and thetrue image of Russia, not for show "Olympic" image of Russia: the country of crazy barbarians attacking and beating their daughters with whips. And what will you say to this, Mr. Putin? Your whole Olympic show was negated and turned on its head with this image. Shame on you, Mr. Putin and shame on you, animal barbaric Russian "Olympic" security forces! This image will become a symbol of Putin's Russia for years!

Video shows Pussy Riot members beaten by Cossacks

Pussy Riot detained in Sochi

NEW: Video shows men in Cossack uniforms beating, pepper spraying band members

NEW: Attackers hit the women with batons, tore off their ski masks, the video shows

Police and Cossacks attacked them in Sochi, the group says

CNN is trying to get comment from Russian authorities

Sochi, Russia (CNN) -- A video released Wednesday shows members of the Russian punk band Pussy Riot being beaten by security officials in Sochi as they tried to film a music video at the port of the city that is hosting the Winter Olympics.

The apparent attack happened just a day after band members Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, as well as journalists and Russian human rights activists, were detained for several hours at a police station located just a few miles from the Olympic Park.

A YouTube video of the new incident shows band members arriving at the port, surrounded by photographers. The women don ski masks in front of a Sochi 2014 sign and, as they began to perform, one band member is immediately pepper sprayed at close range by a man wearing the traditional headgear of the Cossacks.

Some of the women are then struck with a baton before several Cossacks descend on them, shoving and violently removing their ski masks. One of the band members is thrown to the ground by the security men, who also beat a photographer. After the women were beaten and walked away from the port, the security men are seen on the video shoving and beating two other men.

Pussy Riot members detained near Sochi

Ex-Pussy Riot members detained, released

Ambassadors spar over Pussy Riot

The band said it was trying to perform a new song called "Putin teaches us to love our motherland" at the main port in Sochi.

'You sold yourselves to the Americans'

Uniformed Cossacks in traditional fur hats and uniforms have accompanied Russian police as a colorful addition to the massive security presence around the Winter Games.

Tolokonnikova said on her Twitter account that Cossacks beat the band with billy clubs and pepper spray.

Aisya Krugovikh, a member of the band's entourage, said that during the altercation, some Cossacks yelled that Pussy Riot members should "shut their mouths," adding "you sold yourselves to the Americans."

CNN has repeatedly tried to contact Russian city officials by telephone and e-mail for comment on the allegations.

Among those apparently wounded in Wednesday's clash was a Russian artist named Alexei Knyebnikovsky, who Krugovikh said was bleeding from the face.

Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina published photos on their Twitter accounts of bruises on Tolokonnikova's chest and a man with blood on his face "after an attack by Cossacks."

Tolokonnikova also tweeted she was at a Sochi hospital taking care of her husband, who she wrote had "lost vision" due to pepper spray from Cossacks.

The previous day, band members were detained by police, who said they were investigating a theft at the hotel where the band was staying.

Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova, as well as the journalists and activists, were released without charges, but they said they were beaten while in custody.

Pussy Riot: 'no reasons to be afraid'

Pussy Riot: 'It is a system of slavery'

Pussy Riot: We're not thinking of Putin

On Wednesday, Tolokonnikova's husband, Petr Verzilov, told CNN the band had been detained and questioned by Russian security forces three times during a three-day visit to the Olympic city.

"Obviously they are trying to let us know that we're not welcome here," Verzilov said Tuesday in an interview with CNN. "But we treat Sochi as part of Russia and according to Russian law any Russian citizen can go anywhere."

In Sochi for protests

The band members were in Sochi to protest what they said was the lack of freedom of speech and to record the music video critical of Putin.

Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina had been imprisoned for nearly two years after being convicted of "hooliganism" and inciting religious hatred for performing a punk song slamming Putin in a Moscow cathedral and then posting a video of it online.

Since their release, just before the Olympic Games began, they have spoken to journalists about their time behind bars, describing the conditions as squalid and their treatment by guards as demeaning and inhumane.

A third member of Pussy Riot, Yekaterina Samutsevich, was released in 2012.

This month, other band members said Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina were no longer part of the group. But Verzilov said Tuesday that wasn't true.

Comrade Stalin ( words and music by Yu. Aleshkovskiy )Comrade Stalin - you are the great scientist,Linguistics you have learned a lot about,And I'm just a prisoner soveysky (of Soviets)And my friend is the gray wolf of Bryansk.And I'm just a prisoner soveysky (of Soviets)And my friend is the gray wolf of Bryansk.Why I am in this prison, I do not knowBut the prosecutors are apparently right.And so I am in this labor camp in Turuhansky RegionWhere you were in exileyourself at the times of the TzarAnd so I am in this labor camp in Turuhansky RegionWhere you were in exileyourself at the times of the TzarAnd here I am in this Turuhansky RegionWhere the guards are strict and rude,Of course,I understand all of this correctly:This is the "exacerbation of the class struggle". Of course,I understand all of this correctly:This is the "exacerbation of the class struggle" .The rain, the snow, the gnats are all over us,And we are in the taiga from the morning to morning.You were fanning the sparks into the flames of RevolutionThank you, I warm myself by this campfire.You were fanning the sparks into the flames of RevolutionThank you, I warm myself by this campfire.I see as you, dressed in your party capAnd your military tunic are marching to the paradeAnd we chop the wood, and the Stalin's chipsJust as before, are flying in all directions.And we chop the wood, and the Stalin's chipsJust as before, are flying in all directions.Yesterday we buried two MarxistsWe did not cover their bodies with banners:One of them was the "Right deviationist",And the other, as it turned out had nothing to do with anything at allOne of them was the "Right deviationist",And the other, as it turned out had nothing to do with anything at allLive for a thousand of years, Comrade Stalin,And as difficult as it would be for meI know that we will produce a lot of pig iron and steelPer capita in our country.I know that we will produce a lot of pig iron and steelPer capita in our country.(Google Translation with some light editing by M.N.)

Group of Cossacks Attacks Group in Sochi as It Begins Anti-Kremlin Protests

By

OLGA RAZUMOVSKAYA

Updated Feb. 20, 2014 12:33 a.m. ET

Members of the punk group Pussy Riot, including
Nadezhda Tolokonnikova in the blue balaclava and
Maria Alekhina in the pink balaclava, are attacked
by Cossack militia in Sochi, Russia, on Wednesday,
Feb. 19, 2014. Associated Press

MOSCOW—A group of uniformed Cossacks attacked members of the Russian punk group
Pussy Riot with horse whips in the center of Sochi on Wednesday as the group began
an anti-Kremlin protest near the Olympic Games.

Maria Alyokhina told The Wall Street Journal in a phone interview Wednesday that
she and other members of Pussy Riot and four others who were filming them were
beaten by a group of 15 to 20 Cossacks and 10 to 15 plainclothes policemen as the
group began to sing an anti-Kremlin protest song.

Warning: Graphic footage. Pussy Riot was attacked during a performance in Sochi but kept rocking against Putin, and Ukraine violence shows the gulf between the U.S. and Russia. The Foreign Bureau follows the top world stories of the day. Photo: AP

Members of Russian punk group Pussy Riot were attacked by Cossacks in Sochi as they attempted to perform a protest song underneath a banner for the Winter Olympics. Via The Foreign Bureau, WSJ's global news update. Photo: AP

"A few seconds into the song they began
to beat us with batons and pepper spray us.
We didn't even get through the first verse
of the song," she said.

Ms. Alyokhina posted a picture of her badly
cut finger as well as picture of another activist
with a bloodied face on her Twitter account
following the encounter. Photographs taken
by journalists at the scene showed men
brandishing whips and yanking the masks
off the members of the group.

A local police spokesman said several Cossacks
—Russian traditionalists who often function
as auxiliary police—are in Sochi for the Games
but he wasn't aware of the alleged attack
on the band. He said the Cossacks are
usually accompanied by the local police
when on duty, but "they spend the rest
of their time as regular, ordinary citizens."

The Cossacks couldn't be reached for comment.

Two members of Pussy Riot were detained
by police for several hours in Sochi on
Tuesday in what they called an attempt
to prevent them form carrying out their protest.

In the run-up to the Olympics in Sochi,
Russia came under heavy criticism
internationally for a recently passed
law limiting gay rights, as well as
alleged environmental abuses and
corruption, and officials had braced
for protests, although few have materialized.

Pussy Riot gained international attention
in February 2012 when four members of
group—wearing colorful balaclava masks
and tube dresses—stormed into Moscow's
Christ the Saviour Cathedral and acted out
a performance critical of the Kremlin in front
of stunned parishioners, as a wave of protests
swept through the city. The two members who
organized a protest in Sochi were jailed for
nearly two years for the Moscow performance
but were released early in December as part
of an amnesty.

Russia should join NATO: the benefits for the Global Security are enormous

To reformulate Lord Ismay's phrase: 1) Take Russia in, 2) Continue keeping Germany down, 3) Assert and exercise the US leadership position within the NATO as a unifying and directing force and vector.

"Ловец Человеков"

Connected? The halo is there. And the Book is there. And the disciples are there. But where is the Light of Understanding, in this big curved dark tunnel of a vision? Where is the big red dot? Where is the new beginning?

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Hillary Clinton and rock group Pussy Riot

"Great to meet the strong & brave young women from #PussyRiot, who refuse to let their voices be silenced in #Russia. 1:09 PM - 4 Apr 2014" - Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton tweeted a picture Friday of her posing with members of the anti-Vladimir Putin punk rock group Pussy Riot. Clinton met with the women during the "Women in the World Summit" in New York. The group has emerged as chief opponents of Putin, and three members were jailed in 2012 after an anti-Putin performance at a church. The tweet has been re-tweeted almost 10,000 times.